Raspberry Pi Mpeg License Key Generator
If you order the codecs (£2.40 and £1.20) you get a license key that is linked to your RPi serial number. This would be used with whatever media playing solution you have set up on your RPi. Here is a link with more information.
Cueing up some videos to enjoy on my Raspberry Pi yesterday, I made a startling discovery – it wouldn’t play MPEG videos! Has this happened to you? Are you running a RaspBMC media centreHow To Make Your Raspberry Pi Into a Home Theater SystemHow To Make Your Raspberry Pi Into a Home Theater SystemFour weeks on and I’ve been playing with my Raspberry Pi in various ways, from using it to browse the web and standard day-to-day computing tasks to playing around with the various configurations that are..Read More on your Raspberry Pi computer, or enjoy viewing videos through the desktop? Have you noticed that certain video files cannot be played back?
- Raspberry Pi Store. Advanced Search Search Tips. Home; Blog; Categories. License keys. MPEG-2 license key. Choose Options. VC-1 license key.
- (currently: some code gets leaked at some point, and someone starts doing codecs as open source, for fun.
If so, you’re not alone. Many people have run into trouble with the fact that while the Raspberry Pi will happily transcode high definition videos, it seemingly cannot playback MPEG-2 videos. The reason for this is not a hardware failure or even a software failure, however – rather, it is all down to licencing.
Many media players on Windows, Mac OS X and Linux distributions will allow you to enjoy MPEG-2 without any licencing issues, though – so what is going on? What makes the Raspberry Pi so different that it requires a licence to playback MPEG-2 videos, and how exactly does this license work?
MPEG-2 Licencing & The Raspberry Pi
Other operating systems include the cost of the various codecs within the price of the operating system. In the case of Linux distributions, free versions of media encoders and decoders are used instead. But hang on – the Raspberry Pi runs a Linux distribution, so why isn’t the MPEG-2 codec free?
The answer is simple. The Raspberry Pi is designed to be used for education, and while there are many who enjoy its multimedia capabilities, the developers decided to remove MPEG-2 in order to keep costs down. If you want to use MPEG-2, it is there for you to unlock for a small fee. Of course, you might not want to; after all, there are many uses for a Raspberry PiThe Top 5 Amazing Uses For Your Raspberry Pi ComputerThe Top 5 Amazing Uses For Your Raspberry Pi ComputerI’ve recently received my Raspberry Pi after a long wait – and I’ve got quite a few plans for it. The problem is, I’m not totally sure which project I want to attempt first. While..Read More beyond playing back videos.
Raspberry Pi Mpeg License Generator
How To Get The MPEG-2 Licence
In order to install the MPEG-2 licence on your Raspberry Pi, you will first need to find out your device’s serial number. This can be found in the documentation that you included when you first received the computer, but if you don’t have this to hand, don’t worry, you can interrogate the motherboard.
Boot the Pi and open a command prompt in Raspbian. Enter:
The serial number will be displayed last in the resulting text, so copy this down and visit www.raspberrypi.com/mpeg-2-license-key where you will see a short form field in which to enter the serial. Do so and click Add to cart to proceed.
To purchase the MPEG-2 licence you will need to spend $3.50 (or £2.40) – not exactly a fortune, and still pennies next to the $25 price of the computer!
Installing The MPEG-2 Licence On Your Raspberry Pi
With the order made, you will need to wait up to 72 hours for your licence to be received by email (if it doesn’t arrive, you should email the Raspberry Pi people, but the process is usually reliable and efficient).
When the licence key arrives you will find it in a text file as a single line, something similar to:
In order to use this on your Pi, you will need to edit the config.txt file, which can be found in /boot. Simply add the licence as a new line of text as shown above, then save and close.
If you have multiple SD cards for different OS versions – perhaps one for RaspbianOptimize The Power Of Your Raspberry Pi With RaspbianOptimize The Power Of Your Raspberry Pi With RaspbianAs befits a man with too much tech on his hands, I’ve been playing with my Raspberry Pi recently, configuring the device so that it works to its fullest potential. It continues to run as..Read More and one for RaspBMC – you will need to add the licence to each.
Reboot your Raspberry Pi to complete the procedure, and you will then be able to enjoy MPEG-2 videos.
Could I Try a Hacked Codec?
There are – apparently – hacked versions of the codec available online, but really when you consider what might be necessary (for instance, running software to spoof the device serial number) and the fact that the licence is so cheap, this really isn’t worth it.
After all, the Raspberry Pi is a low-cost piece of kit designed with lofty ambitions – to promote IT literacy. The sale of the codec raises money so that the non-profit Raspberry Pi Foundation can work towards its altruistic aims. So don’t go ripping off a codec that costs less than a bottle of beer – pay for it, and help change the world!
Explore more about: Media Player, Raspberry Pi.
i want make my raspberry pi3 disabled kb & mouse only operated by lirc so i want to display images which would kept in encrypted and at the booting that will make a temporary file, from that file the images will display. i don't know how it could be done.
So i need help.The pi store is not working, I am unable to buy a license, does anybody know an alternative place to obtain (buy) the license key for MPEG?
The mission of the pi is great, but this decision I strongly disagree with on principle. The thing is aimed at students and hobbyists, why set it up so you have to pay an extra fee to enable an onboard hardware function? That isnt how open source is supposed to work, in spirit or in practice.
On the other claw, for those using this as a learning platform, heres a purely conceptual exercise. Simple scripting can do some wonderful things. Things like checking the output of a command against a known phrase, and do other things if they dont match. Things like incrementing a value and writing it to an ini file, then rebooting. Once properly set up, the pi could do these amazing things while you are off doing other things, like sleeping. It could even use the LEDs that come with many of the kits to let you know when the values do match. Aint automation great?
I whole heartedly support the RPi foundation aims and £2.40 is a small amount to ask for an official codec. BUT.. having to wait up to 72 hours for it to arrive!!!!
Am I a good boy and wait or do I get a hacked version that can be used now? a question that must be asked by anyone that knows a bit about linux. I will wait as I like to do the correct thing but I do wonder if this delay is entirely necessary when increasing the price by £2.40 at point of purchase for those that want the licence would be a better ideaI had mine within three hours.
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The article didn't really say why you couldn't add a linux MPEG-2 codec to the
Raspberry Pi. It doesn't seem like it would be very hard to add a free MPEG-2
codec since the Raspberry Pi can run many versions of linux. Could someone
explain why a linux MPEG-2 couldn't be ported to the Raspberry Pi very
easily.The CPU would be a bit slow for soft decoding MPEG2. With the key, the RPi does hardware based decoding in the GPU - and since the GPU is closed source, a free codec or driver can't access it the same way.
Thank you for your informative answer Ralf. This is close to what I thought the answer might be.
I can't believe the way Christian went off on me by saying 'But that would be theft.' and 'Are you going to stand in the way of the Raspberry Pi Foundation’s altruistic cause to defeat the IT skills crisis?'
I have no intention of doing either of these things. I am 100% supportive of the Raspberry Pi Foundation's mission. I think that the Foundation and the Raspberry Pi are fantastic and I wish nothing but the best for them. The original question should have been more general in nature. Like, how hard would it be to port a program written for the PC, to the RPi and get it to use the hardware based decoding in the GPU, so that it would run at a decent speed. Probably very hard to do. Sorry if anyone got upset with the question.
Yup..I've had that happen. Couldn't figure out why it was doing that. But, Reddit to the rescue. found out and decided I'm not using my Pi as a media center. Instead, i'll be automating our chickens!!!
Good info. You guys keep giving us more and more on Raspberry Pi.. THANK YOU! Look forward to MUCH more!
If you use RaspBMC only, like me, and lack any real coding practice, there is a field in System Settings to add an MEPG2 license code. Be aware that if you watch a ripped DVD, there will be a pause between .vob files - not a clean switch like a real DVD.
I am waiting for minimum one GB Supporting in Raspberry pi.
So i hope it will come soon.wish i had raspberry pie in india prices for a raspberry unit is high so i cant afford it!
Really? That's a big shame, hope you can find a way to get one soon.
In order to enjoy more diverse media playback on your Raspberry Pi micro computer, you need to manually enable the MPEG-2 and VC-1 codecs. Read on to see how to do so and enjoy DVD playback and more on your Pi.
Why Do I Need To Do This?
The Raspberry Pi was designed to be an educational computer. As part of that educational mission, the Raspberry Pi Foundation has gone out of their way to minimize the manufacturing and licensing costs in order to keep the final cost of the device down. Download soniye hiriye video song for mobile. Part of their cost cutting measures included not purchasing a pricey blanket license to use the MPEG-2 and VC-1 video codecs.
This doesn’t mean the Raspberry Pi is not capable of decoding media encoded in MPEG-2 or VC-1, but that by default the codecs cannot run on the Raspberry Pi hardware for want of a proper license. Fortunately the Raspberry Pi Foundation was able to make arrangements to sell individual licenses for each codec very inexpensively.
If you’re wondering whether or not you’re the target audience for this license sale program and this tutorial, check to see if any of the following statements apply to you:
I’m using my Raspberry Pi as a media center and/or general purpose device and I wish to:
- Watch DVDs (either straight from an attached DVD drive or from ripped .ISO files). In this case you need an MPEG-2 license to decode the video on the DVDs.
- Watch my collection of AVI files. While AVI is technically a container format, not a codec, the vast majority of AVI files are encoded using MPEG-2 and as such you’ll need an MPEG-2 license.
- Watch content I’ve ripped or recorded using Windows Media Center (such as movies or television shows in the WMV container format). For this you’ll need the VC-1 license.
If you’re unsure if you have the files types in question there are two simple ways to check. First, you can try to load the file in your Raspberry Pi media center. If the file is, for example, an MPEG-2 encoded video file there is a very high chance that the audio track will play just fine but the video track will fail to render, leaving the screen black.
The more precise way to check is to examine the file itself using a tool like MediaInfo—you can follow along with our MediaInfo tutorial here. MediaInfo will tell you the specific video codec for any video file you examine.
What Do I Need?
For this tutorial we’re assuming you’ve already got your hands on a Raspberry Pi unit and installed your operating system of choice on it. Further, we’ll be using a copy of Raspbmc for this tutorial under the assumption that many of our readers followed our Raspbmc guide and would now like to add in DVD/WMV support to their build.
Even if you are using another Raspberry Pi distribution, the command line instructions and the manual configuration are still applicable to you and your Pi unit.
We’ll be covering two methods: adding the license code manually and via Raspbmc—a popular Raspberry Pi-enabled distribution of XBMC.
To follow along you’ll need the following things:
- An MPEG-2 (~$4)and/or VC-1 license(~$2) purchased from the Raspberry Pi store.
- Access to the command prompt on the Raspberry Pi (either at the physical device or via SSH).
First, we will walk you through getting the serial number off the board and purchasing the licenses you need. After that, we’ll show you how to manually add the licenses to your Pi or use the built-in tool within Raspbmc.
Purchasing the Licenses
In order to purchase the licenses you need, you will have to retrieve the unique serial number for your Raspberry Pi board. This number is not printed anywhere on the circuit board but is instead stored in the hardware; it must be retrieved using the command prompt.
Retrieving the Serial Number: First, visit the command prompt either at the actual terminal or remotely connected to the terminal via an SSH tool such as PuTTY. If you have a keyboard attached to your Raspbmc machine, simply select “Exit” out of the Raspbmc interface via the power button in the lower left hand side of the GUI. Press ESC to load the command prompt instead of booting back into the Raspbmc GUI. This will deposit you at the command prompt.
Alternatively, if you would like to access the command prompt remotely, fire up your SSH client (such as PuTTY) and enter the IP address of your Rasperry Pi unit.
Account cracker weepcraft hacked. Whether you have pulled up the command prompt directly at the machine or via SSH you will be prompted to login. The default login/password combination for Raspbmc is pi / raspberry.
Once at the command prompt enter the following command: cat /proc/cpuinfo
Your Pi will spit back 11 lines of text, but the only one of interest to us is the last line labeled Serial. Copy the unique 16 digital serial number (partially obfuscated in the screenshot here).
Because the license is granted to each specific Raspberry Pi board, repeat the above process for all Raspberry Pi boards you wish to purchase a license for.
Keygen
Once you have the the serial number for each individual unit, it’s time to purchase the licenses from the Raspberry Pi foundation.
Purchasing the License: Visit the Raspberry Pi foundation’s purchase page for the MPEG-2 license and/or VC-1 license. Enter your Raspberry Pi serial number in the appropriate blank beneath the price. Add the license to your cart. Repeat this process for all the licenses on all the units you wish to add the codecs to.
Although the foundation indicates that it could take up to 72 hours for your license to arrive via email, we received ours in about 24 hours. When your email arrives it will include a code for each license formatted like such:
decode_MPG2=0000000000
decode_WVC1=0000000000
The 0000000000 portion of the license is your unique 10-digit alphanumeric license code.
Installing the Licenses
Now that we have the license codes, it’s time to add them to your Raspberry Pi and get to enjoying enhanced media playback.
Manually installing the licenses: The manual installation technique works for any installation on the Raspberry Pi, including Raspbmc.
To manually install the codecs, you need to power down your Raspberry Pi device, remove the SD card, and mount the SD card on a computer with access to a simple text editor.
Raspberry Pi SD cards include a FAT formatted mini partition that holds startup tools including an easily edited configuration file labeled config.txt. [Note: Some operating systems builds may not automatically create a config.txt file; if there is no config.txt simply create your own.]
Locate the file and make a copy, renaming it config.old—this version will serve as a backup in case anything goes wrong during the editing process. Open up the original config.txt in your text editor of choice (we’re using Notepad++).
License Key Generator Online
Depending on what operating system you’re running on your Pi, the configuration file may look slightly different. Leave the existing entries alone. Cut and paste the formatted license entries you received in your email, like so:
Save the config.txt file and safely eject the SD card from your computer. Return the SD card to the Raspberry Pi and power up the device.
Adding the licenses via the built-in Raspbmc tool: If you’re running Raspbmc, you can skip the whole manually editing the config.txt step and take advantage of the built-in tool right inside Raspbmc.
To do so, head over to your Raspbmc device and navigate from the main interface to Programs –> Raspbmc Settings. Once you are inside Raspbmc Settings, navigate to the System Configuration Tab and scroll down to the the Advanced System Settings section:
There you can click on MPEG2 and VC1 and input your license number. Don’t type in the entire string provided for you by Raspberry Pi, leave off the leading decode_MPG2= and decode_WVC1= portion. Only input the 10-digit string after the equal sign into each codec’s respective slot.
Once you have added the appropriate codec licenses, head back to the main interface and reboot your device via the power selection menu in the lower left hand corner.
Testing the codecs: The most enjoyable way to test your new codecs is to fire up a media file you know wouldn’t play without it, sit back, and watch it play perfectly.
The more technical way to check, should you run into any hiccups and wish to confirm that your license is recognized by the device, is to head to the command prompt and enter the following commands:
vcgencmd codec_enabled MPG2
vcgencmd codec_enabled WVC1
The Pi should immediately return that the codec is enabled. Here’s the output for the MPG2 check on our test machine, for reference:
Everything looks good at the command prompt and the previously audio-only files now play both their audio and video channels. For a few bucks and a few minutes of our time, we’re ready to enjoy the wide variety of videos encoded in MPEG-2 and VC-1 codecs.
Have a pressing Raspberry Pi-related topic you’d love to see us address? Sound off in the comments or write in to tips@howtogeek.com with your suggestions.